For beginner to perhaps intermediate-level students, Japanese words, phrases, and expressions, as learned by an American living in Tokyo. . Some of it I absorbed from my surroundings--slang, abbreviated terms, or new katakana-ized words that have recently entered the Japanese language. Some words are straight-up conventional vocabulary that I've found helpful to know, either in the classroom (where I taught English) or in everyday life, and some words just make me smile.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
やる, やるな, and やるなぁ~
Of course, やる is the same as する, which means to do.
やるな means "don't do that," as placing a な after a verb in its plain form is a strong way to tell someone not to do whatever action the verb denotes.
やるなぁ~ means something along the lines of "good job," "well done," etc.
I just learned the third of these, sort of by accident. I was watching a TV show called Hammer Session, and I heard one of the characters say it but didn't quite understand it. The subtitles translated it as "Aren't you good?" I couldn't understand why やる was used in that situation. Something like 「やった!」 (I did it!) I could see, but やる?
Two days later, I was at my desk in the teachers' room at school, and I overheard one of my Japanese colleagues say 「やるなぁ~」. My head perked up. I asked her what exactly she meant just now, and she explained the differences between the three usages of this word. I went back to the video that night to listen to it again. It turns out I misheard the actress. She doesn't say 「やるなぁ~」; she says 「やるじゃん!」。
I think it means the same thing, though.
There's no embedding code on the video, but if you want to see it the url is:
http://www.drama.net/m1/hammer-session-episode-4/part3
As the link tells you, it's Episode 4, part 3, of Hammer Session.
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おつかれやま!!! (In romaji, "Otsukareyama!!!" In kanji, お疲れ山?)
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